


Sanctuary

by GASP_Nobdy_Special



Category: Sin With Me (Visual Novel)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Humor, Self-Discovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:00:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24241696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GASP_Nobdy_Special/pseuds/GASP_Nobdy_Special
Summary: Caleb North is callous and reserved and irking to just about every person he meets--including MC. But as she begins to understand and explore Cal’s heart beyond the thin film he had set into place, MC starts to believe that surely there’s more to those stunning blue eyes than what’s on the surface. When MC becomes more than someone he’s in debt for, will Cal come to embrace her hospitality or will he deny himself sanctuary?
Relationships: Caleb North/Main Character
Kudos: 8





	Sanctuary

**Author's Note:**

> Word Count: 4,344
> 
> Genre: Fluff (SFW)
> 
> Warning(s): none, just straight detective Cal evaluating the feelings he’s conjured for MC
> 
> A/N: This is based on the song Sanctuary by Joji, I highly recommend listening to the song while you read this; it’s very beautiful!

* * *

Cal couldn’t sleep. 

Too many thoughts purled in his mind and staved the heaviness that was supposed to settle in his eyelids. Even when he attempts to close his eyes tight and focus on slipping off into his dreams, nothing happens except for more thoughts to herd together in his head. Groaning, Cal drags a hand down his face grudgingly. This didn’t happen very often for him; being restless because of emotions _. Emotions._ There was a lot the bittersweet gunslinger was known for and displaying--hell, even struggling with--emotion isn’t one such example. He wasn’t sure where the ache in his heart stemmed from--maybe faulty wiring? A fluke in his cardiovascular system? Chemical imbalance in his head? Whatever the reason, Cal didn’t like it. He recognized the sense of longing parading in his heart, jerking his heartstrings like a pampered child throwing a tantrum. The feeling caused a frown to flip Cal’s expression inside out. He hated that feeling. It made him vulnerable--unlocked the heart he had bolted and chained and boarded shut hundreds of times over. Why now, out of the 27 years he’s been alive and kicking, did his own heart and emotions betray him like this? Then, like an epiphany transmitted from an ethereal being overseeing his moping, a mental painting of MC winks in his thoughts and Cal scoffs reflexively, skeptical. There was no way that MC--a tiny inept girl who acted like she had already had her mid-life crisis seven times over and worked in a bike rental shop alongside her mom--was the cause of his emotional contusion.

Not only did the idea seem unruly and misplaced, Cal disliked it because, deep down, he knew that there was some waft of truth to it. _She’s not that bad of a person for someone who works at a small bike shop..._ The trick shooter almost groans again but he stifles the noise, remembering that Avi was fast asleep just a few feet away from him. He rolls onto his side instead. But somewhere along the journey of executing his plan something falls through; a minuscule detail that nettled him more. The memory of MC curled up in bed beside him explodes into his mind, alongside the glitter bomb of emotion that sparkled and danced and spun in spirals within his rib cage. Frustration follows and Cal’s nostrils flare, crystalline eyes rolling. Why can’t she just be another civilian that Cal meets, forgets, and never sees again? A whole galaxy of regret and longing and some other irately balmy emotion unravel inside of him. Cal grasps a pillow and crushes it against his face and groans, the noise long-winded and muffled as it tickles his face. MC shouldn’t be allowed to have this all encompassing effect on him--both legally and morally. _Lock her up for finessing her dainty little way into the brash and emotionless Caleb North’s heart--don’t forget to throw away the key for good measure._

##  **Go ahead and bark after dark**

Buteven through his fit of annoyance and denial, the one thing Cal couldn’t deny was the distance the two of them had breached--pared. The bland, snapping turtle of a woman had gained her character arch in Cal’s eyes. Now she was more than just the naive and narrow-minded girl Cal had to repay--now she was MC and nothing less than that. It was hard to place a title upon her head beyond anything other than her name; like she’d grown into the name ‘MC’ and earned her dish of respect. Cal thought so at least. Over time, her actions and dialogue told the gunslinger that she had more depth and required more than just a once-over to understand thoroughly--she wasn’t an easy puzzle to decipher. Maybe that’s what appealed to him most--the idea of being totally cognizant of her as an entire person and not just a voice that twittered this and that. Of deciphering something complex but so easy to dissect; swift access beamed into his hands. Cal’s eyes trace the pattern of the ceiling ahead as his thoughts follow a curved and callous rail, all dedicated to the feeling Cal kept aloof in his jumping heart. What was this emotion--this sun that shone in his chest? What did it mean? _Why do I kind of, sort of, possibly not mind it?_

##  **Fallen star, I’m your one call away**

Despite the wisps of confusion wound around his subconscious, Cal knew that it eluded to something bordering fondness-- _affection_. The word sounds like a roll of barbed wire spiking his thoughts and he resists the urge to smack himself upside the head. Damn it all, why did she have to make it so much harder for him? Can’t she just bask on the throne of the person Cal disliked most and keep the crown structurally sound on her head? Again, the convulsing tangle of emotion sprawling throughout his body wrestles the irked retort down, defeating it unconditionally. He didn’t know a thing about requiting feelings and he definitely didn’t know a thing about harboring strong feelings for anyone outside the same six people--er, five if you discount Ripley as an animal--he’s known for years. 

Cal only allowed himself to become attached to people who he could count on and trust--people who had his best interests at heart. Meeting a new person, much less _dating_ , was too big of a step for the gunslinger to judge. Too much of a risk to take. He’d rather leave the whims up to whoever spectated his life and let them call the shots on his destiny. Of course thinking this revives his knowledge of the prophecy and the staccato of his heart trudges, suddenly faced with something almost as staggering as MC. _But not exactly. Nothing could match MC’s oddities._ How was he going to tell her about what he learned? About what fate had whispered in his ear, alluding that he was destined to die? That Avi was to replace him?

MC wouldn’t be game for that--who would be? Like a fallen star, MC is all his mind comes to center around, orbiting tireless circles around her. Somehow, in a cheesy, lovey-dovey sort of sense, she made the dazzling superficial lights of Vegas seem like they’re not shining as bright as they could be. Like MC was naturally able to emit something that could outshine the nacreous luminescence even without the use of actual light. _Yuck, that was grossly romantic thing to think, Caleb._ Though he cringes, his heart nods against his rib cage. And then too late does Cal realize that his face is freckled with the color of embarrassment--sheepishness. _God, I hate that I just admitted that to myself. Didn’t I swear I’d never become a cheap hopeless romantic?_ But this didn’t feel like romance--it felt natural. Something too instinctive and pure to be labeled as ‘romance’ or even the more costly term: ‘love’. MC was a good person to know and a fun person to playfully debate with; someone who could turn even the most shallow subjects into an ocean of chortle-worthy discussion. She deserved more than she had and if Cal could, he’d give her what she wanted--all she had to do was give him a call and he would be there. Whenever and for whatever.

##  **Motel halls, neon walls**

##  **When night falls, I am your escape**

Cal sighs. Maybe now wasn’t the best time to analyze the gallery of warmth strewed in his chest. But--as misfitting as it sounds when describing Cal North--he found himself wanting to explore the profundity of what he felt for MC. The more he knew about himself, the better after all. Like a reel of film shuddering to life in a cinema, memories of all that’s happened since he met MC flicker and coalesce grainy in his mind. There was the encounter in the store with the glue, then the coincident meeting to buy the medical textbook. After that, MC had saved him and in doing so had uncoiled a road of ruched destiny between the two of them. If she hadn’t risked herself to save Cal that day, would they even still know each other the way they did today? Cal doesn’t linger on the question, already knowing that the answer wasn’t tuned to the rhapsody of his emotions. 

But what was the war in his heart became the enlightenment of his mind, casting in potential realities that made the ceiling’s textures swirl before his very eyes. Swimming in denied fates, Cal clutches the pillow he had just used to smother his grumbles and groans close to his chest. In that moment of thoughtlessness--or rather of moving out of reflex and not out of sole subconscious will, Cal experiences a scintilla of desire for something he didn’t immediately recognize--something that seemed close but so far form achievable. Like a pleasant fever dream reminisced in the heart of euneirophrenia. He found that the desire was wanting to hold MC the way he held the pillow; close and intimate, warm and comforting. His face burns again but he so does his heart, flustering as hot as a glowing coal in a furnace. But again, like a hero from some bootleg comic books, the sense of their connection being too organic to be love swoops in and saves Cal from dying form sheer embarrassment. Apparently even Cal North didn’t know what resides inside of Cal North’s heart. 

The irony is more jeering than uplifting to the baffled gunslinger. It was easy to pretend to be suave but to naturally act cool and collected? Cal wasn’t the top of the field when it comes to that sort of spiel. But as if a nighttime pleasure he could rely on, MC’s presence in his mind sweeps aside the bitterness fogging his conscience. Like an escape of sorts, used to skirt around the hardships of being in love. _Being in love? I’m not in love with MC--It’s not the way I am!_ Cal almost shouts the unsaid thought out loud just to wipe away all of the confusion and fuzziness clogging his chest. “I’m not in love.” Cal reiterates quietly. Maybe voicing the misgivings of how he felt would make the godly being overlooking him commiserate and wave its wand to make the sappy feelings maturing in him eviscerate. Maybe him rationalizing the way he felt made him a coward. Maybe Cal was in over his head and this was all just a conclusion he jumped to--and if that was the case, he might have beaten the world record for farthest jump. _Having a heart capable of emotion is hard. Can’t I just be an insentient gunslinger who stars in a circus and doesn’t indulge in the world of romance?_

##  **When you lay alone, I ache**

##  **Something I wanted to feel**

But Cal was dodging the truth. He would be lying to himself if he said he didn’t like the way she made him feel; the constant ray of heat that melted the ice encapsulating his heart. The only other person ever capable of that was Avi--and he was his kid, for god’s sake! And now with the way Cal wanted MC here with him, when had anyone else been able to have that effect on him? His history of partners wasn’t exactly the flashiest or the longest but he hadn’t felt an ache like this one. Like when he was on the rooftop with MC and he stopped her from jumping--the pang had been evident there too. Why? At the time they had only known each other for under a week and Cal felt like he was letting a precious artifact slip from his grasp. Almost as if her importance was too dire to him to risk it. Cal whirls around to face the fireplace and watch the glowing flames thrash against ruddy brick. _How many more questions are you going to ask, Caleb? What are you taking this to be--some sort of funky game show about your love life struggles? A self-funded therapy session?_ It all flabbergasted him--why was he still investigating when he was supposed to be going to sleep?

Somewhere in between evaluating the choices he had made in thinking about MC and wondering why in the world he felt the way he did, Cal tiptoed off into a surprisingly peaceful slumber. Almost immediately, a dream formulates and engulfs him--foggy and thick like mist floating through the air. The first thing he’s greeted with is a familiar room that had a mellow blue palette of colors--bicycle tires line the walls of all sizes, family photos cling to the desk sequestered in the corner... _Wait._ With a jagged start, Cal recognizes the setting he was thrusted into. _This is MC’s room!_ Moonlight flowed in through the window, casting the shadowed room into a silverish blue hue. 

##  **If you’ve been waitin’ for fallin’ in love,**

On the bed, shrouded in the glow of the night sky, is MC. Her posture is relaxed, careless, and for some reason Cal’s pulse skyrockets. _What is wrong with me?_ This feeling...

##  **Babe, you don’t have to wait on me**

Cal felt disdain at the implications it gave--the faint stench of _love_. Of something romantic, something he didn’t want to ever feel. Enthralled in his rancor, he doesn’t notice that he’d been speaking the entire time, saying something that felt teasing as it left his mouth. He felt detached from himself as he moved to sit beside MC, casting her a side glance without will. It was as if he was possessed by something else--unable to move but able to freely think and perceive the situation. In response, MC’s eyebrow hikes and her lips lopside; gently sloped. Again, that hauntingly pleasant ache rips through his chest--salt in a scratched open wound from years ago.

##  **Cause I’ve been waitin’ for Heaven above,**

Her lips moved and a sentence stemmed from her tongue, but it all slips from his mind. All that was certain to Cal was the continuous thump of his heart rattling his rib cage.

##  **But an angel ain’t what I need**

Nothing seemed surreal--everything felt fluid, easily coordinated to flow as easily as a trickling stream. Cal found himself holding on to everything she did, everything she said--despite the fact that he understood none of it. Suddenly he was bewitched with her and everything she was. A symbol of restored security.

##  **Not anyone, you’re the one**

Cal’s turn to contribute to their boneless conversation comes and he watches the way her features dip with contempt--the way they coalesce into something fond but certain. He found himself noticing more about her than he had first realized. Times when her smirtle dropped off were substituted by the scintilla of softness wading through her brown eyes, noticeable only when Cal wasn’t focused on what to say next. On autopilot, controlled by something unseen tugging him along on strings, Cal could marvel each expression she allowed to show. Each one was almost as breathtaking as the last with the specific emotion it was based on bringing it to life. He found himself wanting to bury himself into her very essence, wanting to meld with her like she was pool of everything he wanted--a pool of endless comfort, secluded from the world in her bedroom. A safe place. A sanctuary.

##  **More than fun, you’re the sanctuary**

Weirdly enough, Cal got the strangest itch that she felt similar--not exactly the same, but alike enough to be considered mutual. A common feeling shared but not prescribed the same title.

##  **'Cause what you want is what I want,**

##  **Sincerity**

And for a while, their mindless repartee continues on with empty words and fortuitously pretty expressions. Cal had never been one to daydream much--there was more important things to do than wish the world turned the other way--but it was hard not to fantasize about what could be. About what would it feel like to release the warmth bouncing in her chest--unleash the feelings he so desperately wanted to be fictitious. What would MC do? Would she sink his serendipitous boat or row it with him? How would a world like that look like? Just like this one, with pointless bickering 24/7, or something completely different? Caught in a web of effervescence, Cal didn’t notice that the steady heat cradling his hand was MC’s. An anchor that grabbed him from his active imagination, Cal notes the gentleness of her skin and the way she gripped his fingers carefully--like they’d fall off if she let go. And to be honest, Cal thought they might too with how he couldn’t will them to move even the slightest inch. 

##  **Souls that dream alone lie awake,**

He hadn’t felt this at ease for a while--not since he had met MC, that was for sure. There were moments of rarity where he could escape all of the hardships of demon hunting and being a parent; moments where the world fell away and a bubble hid them away. Like a disguise in plain sight, it seemed any peace was turned to ash too soon--grains falling from grip. Cal knew this was a moment of that--a ripe example of being content with solitude together. His eyes memorize the gentle angles and sharp swoops characterizing MC’s face. Who knew Caleb North could find someone that soothing to latch onto?

They chatted and bickered and then chatted again, their faces obtuse with sly and challenging smirks. Even though he felt his mouth move and he understood that there were comprehensible words strung out, Cal’s head couldn’t perceive the meaning of it all; like a memory to foggy to make out, or a dream so pleasant that seconds after awaking, it’s lost on you. A weird sort of tension befell their repartee and an even weirder string of anticipation and need foam his thoughts. Like a psychic link between them, Cal could sense that the same thing was actively happening to MC as well. Suddenly, without seemingly any provoking required, Cal wanted to kiss her. He wanted it to happen so badly that it seemed like his heart would crash out of his chest and hop around the room. 

##  **I’ll give you something so real**

MC’s eyes were intense as they bore into him, searching, seeking for something Cal didn’t understand. The tension between them is hot enough to burn, thick as sunny humidity and as tempting as the aroma of sweet cooking. Like a flower introduced to spring, the tension grows and thrives, winding vines of temptation around them. Without thinking, Cal leans into her personal space, blue eyes roving her face for signs of approval; permission. Fully expecting her to pull away, Cal is astonished as she mirrors his movements until their breaths mingled together. His heart might as well have ascended to overdrive as his thoughts melted into puddles of goo. There was a pause of recollection--consideration of what was about to be done--before the wall between was downed.

##  **If you’ve been waitin’ for fallin’ love**

Cal swayed towards her and their lips connected.

##  **Babe, you don’t have to wait on me**

The clock on the wall seems to silence and the seconds cease ticking by--almost like time was freezing to keep them swathed in this moment. She felt like velvet caressing his mouth--just the way he had imagined she would. As if choreographed, their tongues dance together in perfect harmony, their lips embracing over and over again.

##  **‘Cause I’ve been waiting for Heaven above,**

Cal perceived her taste as something sweet--a pinch of sugar sinking into his taste buds, something he’d never be able to get enough of.

##  **But an angel ain’t what I need**

Her teeth gently scrape his bottom lip and he’s caught in the moment, basking in the rejoice he felt here in her arms, kissing her passionately. She began to drown his senses and soon Cal started to wish things he’d never admit aloud.

##  **Pull me oh-so-close,**

He wished this kiss would never end--that he could live off her breath, off her lips, off of her kiss hugging his mouth for the rest of his days.

##  **Cause you never know**

He wished he could dwell in the sanctuary her proximity granted him and that she’d always give him permission to. 

##  **Just how long our lives could be**

Their kiss remains platonic and affectionate, not a boundary crossed and not a checkpoint untouched. He pulls her closer, reigning in her warmth, just as all of it is sucked away and he’s left blinking sleepily at a distant crackling flame. It takes a moment for Cal to realize why MC wasn’t with him, enthralled in their own little world of kisses. _It was a dream._

The disappointment is debilitating as Cal sits up, frowning to the point of almost pouting. Why couldn’t it have been real? He wanted it to be real. To be wrapped up in the vivacity of MC unrestrained--unguarded. Cal’s head swims with the tangible memory of MC’s mouth on his, exploring him intimately. It had felt so real and so right--like an event meant to happen in the forgoing future. He goes florid as a ripple of heat sounds within his body, loud in the way it made his heart squeal. There was no way, no way that was true; Cal refused to believe it. Was the future paved the way he wanted? That he’d live through the harsh destiny of the prophecy and come to grapple the idea of telling MC how he felt? Thinking this brings the prophecy back the to the forefront of his mind and it ricochets off all of the pleasant thoughts Cal had conjured. What was he supposed to do about that? He had already thought of a solution but it was insanely risky and if they had failed... well, there would be no more Caleb North beyond written on a granite headstone in some graveyard. He swats away the thought almost as fast as he thinks it, frowning to himself. That kind of thinking was going to jinx him in the end; he had to stay strong for the people around him. For Avi, for the troupe, for Ripley... _For MC..._ What if he never got to say what he wanted to?

What if the emotion pulsing in his chest, sheltered by a bone enclosure, never saw the light of day? What if he let MC go without even trying to tell her the storm raging on in him? Cal shoulders the staggering idea aside and sighs, running a hand down his face. Maybe MC would be his cause of death; that’d be something he’d oddly be able to stomach. _I’ll just write a note--in case this plan falls through. So she knows what was happening between us is real._ Cal swings his legs off of his bed and stands, stretching drowsily. Maybe writing this was going to be the death of him too--except it’d be gruesomely embarrassing and would make him cringe even in the afterlife. _Maybe I say too many ‘maybe’s to be surprised when they don’t happen._ Cal quickly retrieves a scrap of paper and a pen and returns to his bed. Though the inflation of inspiration he had caught had been enough to motivate him, now it was nothing more than a shriveled echo in his head. Now he was faced with the doubt and uncertainty of writing the actual note.

##  **If you’ve been waitin’ for fallin’ in love,**

Cal uncapped the pen and stuck the end of it between between his teeth. What could he write? There was so much that he wanted to say--an avalanche of unsaid desires and feelings sprawling throughout his mind--and yet he didn’t know what to say. _Do I go the poetic route and write some sort of evasive and cheesy poem? Do I be straight to the point and write what I want from her? Do I pull it off as a goof and just slide in my feelings?_ Cal ponders approach after approach, individually weighing the pro’s and con’s of each. Almost all of them seemed too dumb to even fathom except for one. _I’ll just be blunt. Nothing’s more powerful than the truth, right?_ Cal swallows. Execution was solved and now came the hardest part: what words would he scribble onto this note? It was small so nothing like a novel in length. A sentence or two sounded the most reasonable and--even though he doesn’t have a plan set into place--Cal presses the tip of the pen against the paper, mulling over what he should write. Desires of all sorts stream through his head and Cal writes the first that shuttles to the front of his mind. 

_I want to kiss you._

##  **Babe, you don’t have to wait on me**

Blushing, Cal moves to scribble the phrase out and toss it aside; start anew. But he hesitates. It was blunt and didn’t betray the emotions his heart sang for MC so what was the harm in leaving it be? He visualizes a scale in his head and weighs the pro’s and con’s yet again, finding staggering disparity in weight between the two of them in the favor of the pro’s. _It’s what I want and besides, it was innocuous. Acquaintances kiss when they want to all the time, right?_

##  **‘Cause I’ve been waitin’ for Heaven above,**

The sharpshooter struggles to rationalize his feelings for the fifth time that night and just proceeds to give up, folding the note in half before tucking it inside the envelope. Whatever happened happened and if his true feelings are unveiled, then so be it. But oddly enough, he finds solace in the idea of watching her reaction--seeing what emotions she let show. _Beyond the stereotypical surprise, of course._ Maybe that’d help him understand the depth of her feelings and, coincidentally, his own too.

Maybe he’d find sanctuary right where he was in life--right where he wanted it.

##  **But an angel ain’t what I need**

As begrudgingly as Cal confesses, his opinion of romance changed:

Maybe it wasn’t so bad after all.

##  _~FIN~_

**Author's Note:**

> Whew, this was a ride to write but it was SO worth it. Hope you enjoyed, lovelies 😘


End file.
